My Philosophy column just published in the new Idler magazine. This has been a great year if you are into UFOs – or “unidentified aerial phenomena”, UAPs, as we are now asked to call them. The US government released a report in June confessing that it had no way of explaining dozens of reports of… Continue reading Alien Nation – finding the good in UFOs
Posts
Dante’s Inferno and the meaning of descent, with Rupert Sheldrake
Watch on YouTube! Also on your podcast feed. The Divine Comedy by Dante is one of the great spiritual works of the Christian tradition. But how can it be read and what does it mean? In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon discuss the first part of Dante’s cosmic pilgrimage.… Continue reading Dante’s Inferno and the meaning of descent, with Rupert Sheldrake
Plato, Eros & Beautiful Bodies. A critique of God: An Anatomy
An MP3 version of this talk, and others, is available at my podcast channel, Talks and Thoughts, available on podcast feeds. I much enjoyed the conversation with Hetta Howes, Matthew Sweet and Francesca Stavrakopoulou on God: An Anatomy. It was broadcast on BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinking (https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00114py). We had a good conversation over profound… Continue reading Plato, Eros & Beautiful Bodies. A critique of God: An Anatomy
Homo Sapiens? Mark Vernon & Charles Foster in conversation
An MP3 version of the talk is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available on podcast feeds. Few have explored the nature of being human more directly than Charles Foster. He writes about his experiences in the wild in his books, Being A Beast and, most recently, Being A Human, raising profound questions about our… Continue reading Homo Sapiens? Mark Vernon & Charles Foster in conversation
Apocalypse Now: Arnold Toynbee, William Blake and our understanding times
An MP3 version of this talk can be found at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, that should be available from a podcast feed. The British historian, Arnold Toynbee, is currently out of fashion. The British poet and artist, William Blake, is not, though he is rarely well understood. So what might they have to say… Continue reading Apocalypse Now: Arnold Toynbee, William Blake and our understanding times
Spiritual Intelligence: what it is, why its needed, how it might return
I’ve a new long form essay up at Perspectiva. The YouTube above is an introduction. This is how it begins… “I recently became a wizard. Unfortunately, my assumption of the role involved neither magical rites nor secret lore. Rather, I became a wizard of a pedestrian type, increasingly common in a technological age. I am… Continue reading Spiritual Intelligence: what it is, why its needed, how it might return
The Tragedy of the Spiritual Commons: review of The Dawn of Everything by Davids Graeber and Wengrow
An MP3 version of the post is at my podcast channel, Talks and Thoughts. A shorter, written article version of my talk follows below. And here’s the link to the post I mentioned in the talk, on Homo spiritualis – https://youtu.be/0XUWYn8SyT8. The new book by David Graeber and David Wengrow, The Dawn of Everything: A… Continue reading The Tragedy of the Spiritual Commons: review of The Dawn of Everything by Davids Graeber and Wengrow
Dante and Spiritual Intelligence – a lecture to the Temenos Academy
An MP3 version of the talk is online here. This lecture was given to the Temenos Academy on Tuesday 19th October 2021 – a particular delight as it was on its perennial philosophy course that the Divine Comedy first began to open up to me. See here for more details – https://www.temenosacademy.org I make some… Continue reading Dante and Spiritual Intelligence – a lecture to the Temenos Academy
Climate crisis: spiritual crisis. Five principles as consciousness changing practices
An MP3 version of the talk is here. Our carbon consuming culture has completely internalised the belief “that the world is made up of dead stuff plus active minds and acquisitive wills,” wrote Rowan Williams in This Is Not A Drill: An Extinction Rebellion Handbook. We have forgotten the spiritual intelligence that knows how to… Continue reading Climate crisis: spiritual crisis. Five principles as consciousness changing practices
Gnosticism, Then & Now – a conversation with Rupert Sheldrake
A MP3 version of the conversation is here. The label “gnostic” is used to recommend and condemn. So what is, and what was, Gnosticism? This episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, with Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon, takes a lead from a series of fascinating essays exploring the ancient movement and its modern forms by the… Continue reading Gnosticism, Then & Now – a conversation with Rupert Sheldrake